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Zero Percent [BBB2014; Mikey/Ray] THREE
FOUR.
I was worried about Gerard. They started going out late, coming back at weird times every morning, hanging about with their friends Brian and Frank and Bob. I don’t know what they were doing, but I was concerned.
Had they gone back to the liquor again? I didn’t trust them to not relapse. They assured me they hadn’t, and they never seemed to be hungover, so I believed them, albeit grudgingly.
“Where do you go all day?” they’d asked me, looking concerned one night. I kept eating my BLI mac and cheese. It tasted like it had always done, a step up from cardboard. I was kind of disappointed it didn’t taste better off the pills, but I guess BLI doesn’t need to make things tasty.
“Out.”
“Out where? It’s dangerous, Mikes.”
“The dracs protect us, Gerard. I am fine.”
I think I had gotten so used to hiding my distrust of BLI and Battery City that I had started covering my ass everywhere. Gerard had immediately looked angry at me, like I’d done something wrong. According to BLI, at least, I hadn’t.
“Cut the crap, Mikeyway. You know the dracs are fucking monsters,” they snarled, stabbing at their food.
I kept a straight face. “The draculoids are here to keep Battery City safe.”
“What are you, a BLI drone, now? You’ve fucking changed.”
“It’s better than being an unregistered mutant.”
If I could pinpoint a time where I’d driven a wedge in our relationship, it would have been right there. Gerard’s face turned from horrified to disgusted in seconds.
“You registered?” they sounded wrecked, their voice climbing an octave in two words.
“It’s the responsibility of every Battery City Citizen.” I’d made my bed, and now I had to lie in it, even though I’d made it with razor blades and nails.
“When did they get to you, Mikey? When?” they demanded, leaning closer to me and over the mac and cheese.
“They didn’t, I felt it was time to become an Upstanding Citizen. I’m sick of being shoved around.” I blurted out, immediately wishing I could take it back.
“I wish I’d never bothered with you, Mikey Way.” They snarled, throwing the dishes in the sink and stomping to their room.
The next day when I got home, Gerard had some friends over. Frank and Brian, I remembered from when I’d detoxed. They hadn’t changed, still covered in illegal tattoos. I didn’t agree with Gerard making friends with the likes of these guys, they were too much of a BLI target troublemaker, but they were their own person. I didn’t get to make their choices for them.
“Would you like something to drink? Water, coffee?” I offered, what manners I had kicking in. My mother raised me well, at least.
“No, thank you,” Brian said, politely deferring, whilst Frank shot out, “So you’re the BLI drone.”
I blinked at him, keeping my face blank. Brian smacked his arm, reprimanding him. “Don’t insult the man in his own home.”
“I can insult the fucker whenever I fucking like, thank you very much! I don’t deal with dracs-in-training and scarecrow-fuckers.”
“If it’s any consolation,” I bit out, “I’ve never knowingly fucked a scarecrow.”
That startled a laugh out of Frank, and I went to the kitchen to percolate a pot of coffee.
I heard laughing, and I went out into the main room with my cup of shitty black coffee, to the sight of Gerard’s multiple bags, all full of their shit.
“Where are you going?” I asked, looking suspiciously at their bags.
“Out.” I could feel this conversation mirroring the one we’d had last night. I wasn’t impressed.
“Out where?”
“I’m going to crash at Frank’s place.”
“Why?” I tried not to sound petulant, like a little kid, but I probably whined a little bit.
“Because I want to, and I don’t want to be in the same house as my fucking freak of a brother.”
I tried not to be hurt, but I really, really was. “Oh. Well, in that case, have fun with your hooligan pals. When the Exterminators pick you up, don’t try to call me for help.”
They walked out of the house, slamming the goddamn door, leaving me in the front room with a mug of cold coffee and an empty house. The next time I’d see them was not a pretty moment.
70%
Starting the first day of proper Exterminating was something Mikey had been dreading for a long while coming. He was scared of killing, scared of having to work with and play nice with dracs, scared of meeting someone he knew and having to make a call on it. Scared of BLI finding out about the pills in his cupboard which he hadn’t been taking.
“Michael. How nice to see you,” Vladimir said when Mikey reported in.
“And you, sir.”
“Good to see you’re integrating well with your responsibilities. Now, I would like to discuss your mutational abilities and help you understand how they will work with your roles and responsibilities here at S/C/A/R/E/C/R/O/W.
“You will be allowed to use your mutational abilities on the job, however you are not permitted to use them outside of this. Due to the power and nature of your abilities, we have decided you will be most useful in tracking down other mutants, especially those who aim to cause chaos in our City. You have been put on the patrols which aim to do as much, however you will be working with an Exterminator partner whilst you are still new to the ranks.
“Your partner will be Exterminator Toro from the Mutant Div. II. He is also a new recruit, so you shall be given fairly simple assignments. I assume you know Exterminator Toro?” Vladimir stopped in his monologue for Mikey to nod. Mikey did.
“Good, then that shall make this process easier. You will be investigating the recent increase in rebellious graffiti by an artist known as Party Poison. You should attempt to arrest him, so we can see if he is just the tip of the iceberg - so to speak - or a lone dissident.”
Mikey didn’t understand the iceberg analogy, (he didn’t know what an iceberg was, and whatever it was, it sounded bad), but he was reminded of something Gerard had said after he’d gotten sober. “I’d poison any party I go to now.” Gerard had said, and Mikey felt even more angry at BLI than he thought possible. Fuck Vladimir, fuck BLI, fuck Battery City. They’d made him lose his brother, and now all he had was this. That was what they did, and it was fucked up.
Vladimir gave him access to their file on Party Poison, including images of Party Poison’s artwork. Whilst he was waiting for Toro he looked through the file. At each picture he felt the pit in his stomach grow like a large, round stone that was weighing him down.
The art style, the slogans: Mikey would recognise them anywhere. He had pictures very similar tacked up in his room, above his bed. These were more stylised and simpler than the ones he had, but they were still similar enough that he would recognise them anywhere.
Gerard might not be Party Poison, but they definitely played a huge fucking part in picking the fucking designs. And Mikey was meant to apprehend them. Fuck, the whole reason he’d done this was to save Gerard, and now he was faced with ruining Gerard’s life to save his own ass, or sacrificing himself to buy some time for Gerard (because even if he tried to sabotage this investigation they’d just spring back, two people to replace every one he killed).
He wanted to puke up his shitty BLI-issued oatmeal breakfast.
Ray came out of his meeting with his division head, all smiles and bouncy hair. Mikey waved him over, and closed down his hologlass.
“Hi Mikey!”
“Hello, Ray.”
“I was thinking we could start by checking out the outskirts of town, hit a couple of the bars and ask around, yeah? It would be better, start seeing the scene these guys probably run in.”
Mikey didn’t have any better suggestions, so he shrugged, acquiescing. They headed to the car that they were provided by BL/ind for investigations like this.
FIVE.
The apartment felt empty. It was empty and it was scary and it was like that for weeks, for months. The Party Poison case was infuriating, and shelved soon after we got it. We were put on a bunch of other cases, more small time shit, and most of it seemed to connect back to the Party Poison case. It was a massive clusterfuck, and the more we worked on it, the more it got all tangled together.
I can clearly remember shooting three people dead in the process. The first time I puked my guts out the second I got home, and didn’t stop retching all night. The second time I had nightmares, waking up in cold sweats to see their faces behind my eyelids and I was so fucking freaked, so freaked out I couldn’t stop hallucinating about their screams. The third time I could see the first two’s faces in my mind’s eye as I pulled the trigger.
I started taking my full prescription after that. It made things like that better, I didn’t feel too bad. After cold sweats and hallucinations and screaming my throat raw without even knowing, anything was better. Gerard wasn’t there to help me, and they had been the only thing that had kept me together before.
That was maybe a month after Gerard left, and I think if they were there things would either be better or worse.
After that I was on the pills, and things were mostly better. Killing was smoother (is that better or worse?), and I didn’t have to pretend to be on the pills in front of other BLI employees, in front of Ray.
But then me and Ray (Ray and I?) started fucking. In the scheme of things, it was NOT the smartest idea I’ve ever had. But I did it, and I got emotionally invested. It was one of those things you couldn’t blame on the pills, it was all me. I can see that now, I could see it then.
The things that attracted me to Ray were many, and varied. But his softness, the way he was wholeheartedly loyal, passionate, and sweet, those were all such innocent qualities that were hard to find in the circles we ran in. (Also, his fantastic cock didn’t hurt his case.)
I could see the flashes of love and hurt in his eyes as I told him I loved him and then kissed him with the same mouth I swallowed my prescrip every day with.
BLI pills don’t make you devoid of emotions, they just put a filter over them. People here seem to forget that, seem to forget that BLI doesn’t take away your entire life, it still lets you have fun, just in dosed quantities. Healthy amounts of serotonin and adrenaline, but just enough so you don’t get addicted.
I remember nights spent kissing Ray, lazing around in bed. Waking up in the mornings to his smile, investigating with him, sitting down to dinner (still as shitty as ever but) together. I think it was the happiest I’d been in a long time, since this whole shit started.